The faster your ship the higher the Defence Rating, something Escorts and raiders enjoy quite much. The defense rating supposedly makes enemy fire miss your ship even though it looks like they are hitting your ship. Here is what I think makes this buff OP for escorts; when in trouble players fly around irraticaly trying to max out speed so the defense rating is highest so they receive little to no damage from beams or cannon fire, yet they at still able lay down accurate fire on their target. That doesn't make any sense. In reality the faster you fly the less accurate you hit your target, so why in the game escorts can get both? Escorts want to be like tanks and deal heavy damage but they don't share any abilities with cruisers yet they are able to self heal just as efffective. I say to balance things out ir your defence rating is real high then your accuracy should drop to lower level untile you slow down. That should deminish the tacticts a lot of escort players that use to fly around the enemy player at high speed and dealing heavy damage while receiving none. Its's not like the ships with slower speed gets weapons boosted for being slow, nor does the accuracy is boosted while being slow. It should but it is not the case at the moment. Maybe someone should bring it up in the next Q&A with Stah.

Defense is not buffed by speed.
Defense is penalized by a lack of speed.

If your speed is below 24 impulse, you suffer a penalty to your Bonus Defense.
If your speed is at 24 or above, there's no additional Bonus Defense.
Your Bonus Defense will be the same at 30, 40, 50, whatever...as it was at 24.

Escorts do get a +10% Defense bonus though (while moving - doesn't appear to apply while standing still).

You can also get +15% from 9 in Maneuvers as well as +10% from Elusive.

There's also gear, etc, etc, etc.

It's not difficult for folks to get to 24 impulse at all. Unlike the Escorts though, for the most part, other folks don't have to deal with the 45 arc of DHCs and the need to slow to line up/stay on the target. In slowing, they're possibly going to get hit by the penalty.

That being said, it is somewhat odd that there is not a penalty to accuracy for going over 24 impulse. Course, it's something that allows my Eng in his Escort with beams to fly around with +90% Bonus Defense (no penalty for being below 24, Elusive (+10%), 9 Maneuvers (+15%), Escort (+10%), Aegis Engine (+5%), Aegis 2pc (+5%)) never having to slow...so uh...heh, it would require an adjustment on my part if they did introduce such a penalty.

Don't forget on the other side, you can get +10% Acc from Accurate, +15% Acc from 9 in Targeting, as well as any Acc you get from weapons or other gear. There's also the various means by which you can snare/slow/root a target to drop their speed below 24 so they incur that defense penalty. Sure, Escorts are likely to have dual APO (possibly DOFF'd) and some will sport PH for the gap between them...but there's still SNB, BTE, STE, and all sorts of other stuff that you can do.

Here is what I think makes this buff OP for escorts; when in trouble players fly around irraticaly trying to max out speed so the defense rating is highest so they receive little to no damage from beams or cannon fire, yet they at still able lay down accurate fire on their target. That doesn't make any sense. In reality the faster you fly the less accurate you hit your target, so why in the game escorts can get both?

I say to balance things out ir your defence rating is real high then your accuracy should drop to lower level untile you slow down. That should deminish the tacticts a lot of escort players that use to fly around the enemy player at high speed and dealing heavy damage while receiving none.

You know, I'm a little surprised I have never even seen this one mentioned (Not saying it hasn't been before)..
It is kind of a simple thing in a way.. the faster you fly the less Accurate you become..

Although I guess that's if we think in terms of Manual Targeting, which most ships don't have. It's typically Point and click. How ever there are times in trek where the automatic Targeting has to be turned off and it has to be switched to Manual. Hmm.. (As I'm even writing this I hear Worf's voice in my head saying that very thing "Targeting Systems Damaged. Switching to Manual")

Although the space portions of the game aren't done in a FPS variation either.. If something is in your arc, and you have enough Accuracy to Equal or Beat the targets defense, you hit. Hmm...

You think that your beta test was bad?
Think about this:American Football has been in open beta for 144 years. ~Kotaku

The faster your ship the higher the Defence Rating, something Escorts and raiders enjoy quite much. The defense rating supposedly makes enemy fire miss your ship even though it looks like they are hitting your ship. Here is what I think makes this buff OP for escorts; when in trouble players fly around irraticaly trying to max out speed so the defense rating is highest so they receive little to no damage from beams or cannon fire, yet they at still able lay down accurate fire on their target. That doesn't make any sense. In reality the faster you fly the less accurate you hit your target, so why in the game escorts can get both? Escorts want to be like tanks and deal heavy damage but they don't share any abilities with cruisers yet they are able to self heal just as efffective. I say to balance things out ir your defence rating is real high then your accuracy should drop to lower level untile you slow down. That should deminish the tacticts a lot of escort players that use to fly around the enemy player at high speed and dealing heavy damage while receiving none. Its's not like the ships with slower speed gets weapons boosted for being slow, nor does the accuracy is boosted while being slow. It should but it is not the case at the moment. Maybe someone should bring it up in the next Q&A with Stah.

You do understand that in order to provide the heavy dmg you are talking about an escort has to run DHC with a 45 degree arc right ? They are not flying "Circles" around you and taking no dmg... while dishing it out.

I am going to guess you don't fly escorts very often... I would suggest you fly one for a week so you better understand the tactics so you can better counter it.

Yes people will evasive while in a fight for 2 reasons... 1) yes evasive itself gives a defense boost... and 2) it allows you to more quickly get back into position to continue firing the 45 degree weapons.

I'm sorry but this one comes down to learn to play... I am going to bet you Don't run a target engines right ? ... How about a tractor beam, do you have one ? ... if you have a tractor beam do you use it properly or do you click it the second its off cool down. ... Do you have Eject Warp Plasma ? ... Do you run Viral Matrix ?

Let me give you a few tips that will have you slaughtering all but the best escort pilots... or at least forcing them to run away.

1) Target Engines 1 or 2.... Yes this is a great skill that not many people run... it has a fairly good chance to knock the system offline which will 100% stop an escort, very few escorts will have an engi team handy... or a teammate to toss them one. (if they do have a healer pay attention and time it properly) Even if you don't get an offline... taking 20-40 power off there engine system will slow them down nicely.

2) Tractor beam... DON'T just hit it cause your cool down is up... First check the escorts buff bar... if they have omega up WAIT for the time on it to drop off. I like to engage a tractor as I see some one passing very close to me, and as there omega has 2-3s left on it... this way they will pass me. (you can reverse if you need to) and the tactor will almost always kick in with them having NOTHING pointing at you but turrets... it will frustrate and annoy the Average escort dude.

3) if your in a sci ship use some VM... nothing more annoying to an escort then a VM lock down.

4) Eject Warp Plasma. Get good at laying this at the right time... and you will again annoy most escorts... get good at dropping it with your OWN engine buffs up and you will score plenty of escort kills.... in other words drop it with your EVASIVE up, or aux to damp... or an omega if you have one on a tactical type sci/cruiser.

5) Chron mines... great option for sci ships and cruisers... again if you just dropping them on auto fire there not likely going to do to much... but if you use them right they can be a nasty debuff... I won't say this is the strongest option as omega counters it now... still can work but they are hard to time against buffs.

Anyway theres a few ideas for you and there are plenty of other ways to counter speedy escorts... I think the best way to sum up all the good options though is to say that you can't just dumb fire any of them... use your counters properly and time them and lone escorts shouldn't be a the uber wonder weapons you seem to make them out to be.

Speed tanking is ideal for escorts, but lately the problem is that escorts can tank with heals and damage reduction on top of the usual speed tanking. Reducing defense rating seems like the least invasive way to balance ship types at the moment.

Speed tanking is ideal for escorts, but lately the problem is that escorts can tank with heals and damage reduction on top of the usual speed tanking. Reducing defense rating seems like the least invasive way to balance ship types at the moment.

They have a +10% Defense Bonus over other ship types.
The +Defense Bonus from APO is lasting the full 15s instead of just the listed 5s.

There are plenty of ways to slow us escort players down. Speed tanking is our speciality second to damage!

Jeez.. so many escort nerf threads lately.

If you know oyu are going to come up against an escort, alter your build. Adapt, overcome, improvise!

Agreed, when playing against those with the right builds and know how, i dont care how fast your little scooter/scort is you will get mass slowdown from multiple different tactics, it can be quite annoying at times